Under the silver glitterball the upstairs room at Camden's Lock Tavern is filling up nicely. First act Tail Feather, a Reading quartet who parade a fairly somnambulant line of psychedelic pop, rustle up some tunes that could be described as the kind of music you might find in some Hollywood movie set in a small midwest town. It's nothing to write home about, and I doubt they will. Still, fair do's, at this time of the evening the first act on never has a full room or a crowd that is given to stage watching, more intent on still drinking down to the bottom of their glasses.
After the inevitable long changeover pause come Low Moon Low. And low it definitely was. This south London bunch seem to spend an inordinate amount of time looking at each other, fiddling with equipment, in a bewildered kind of way; occasionally hitting things (well, in the drummer's case, the others given to mere twiddling of knobs) and generally not just taking an age to get going, but also putting in long pauses between each song, so that their set felt way way longer than it actually was. They've been called moody and wistful, and given that their debut single 'Slow Train' of last year was produced by Paul Savage (Franz Ferdinand, Flaming Lips) who must have seen something in them, but you have to ask yourself what? One man's 'atmospheric' is another's 'zzzz', and when the vocalist tells the punters how they're still working on their stage banter, the retort in one's head is the obvious: 'I'd work on the songs a bit too, if I were you', although the songs and guitars were in fact better than the often out of tune vocals. Things pick up slightly towards the end of their set, but it's still painful.
Finally, and way past their scheduled stage time, night headliners, Blank Maps, take to the stage. The ambient four-piece have been picking up a name for themselves, both in their native Newcastle and further afield to Europe and North America - provided a solid, competent set that shown with a danceable pop vibe, melodic and reminiscent of The Maccabees here and there.
They get off to a fine start, using effects pedals on 'Intro' that glide rather than blast their way through the set's oeuvre - that only comes 30 seconds or so in as they segue into 'Madridista' (one of four new songs included in the set) where Thom Piddock's vocals reach into falsetto range on this amiable toe-tapper. The same mood prevails into 'We Go Way Back', given extra aplomb by some girls in the audience from the Maps' hometown. '4th Song' - which was so new on this outing that it was still going under a working title than an exact final name - builds nicely from the off with Piddock's own vocals joined by guitarist comrade in harmonising to hit just the right mood; while elsewhere 'Just Call' is suitably dramatic in parts with stirring drums and striking guitar chords. The best is probably left to last with 'Everything Ends', arguably their best song so far: atmospheric swelling guitars working in partnership alongside scintillating percussion and euphoric bass notes, while pinned aloft by the quivering vocal inflections.
Blank Maps have everything in the right place, from the welcoming blend of intoxicating melodies to a shimmery guitar glaze that even the Tavern's glitterball was hard pressed to equal on this evening.
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